upgrade swap gone wrong?

[woodekm]

O K..........


I know this is a little late for some of you, but..

If you are doing the two SIM shuffle (qualified for the iP4S on an old line with plans of moving the sim of your common line - iP4, etc - to this new iP4S),

BEFORE you activate or do ANYTHING, call ATT. There is apparently an issue with the old vs. new SIM cards - something about one being 4G capable etc. Not sure if its an excuse or what, but whatever.

They will activate, send test calls, email, text and voicemail. YOU WILL BE USING THE NEW SIM CHIP WITH YOUR COMMON USED PH NUMBER. Not your old one (chip).

ALSO. It helps if you have two ph lines so they can activate the new phone and SIM with your old Acct info/data plan, and keep you on the line.


My wait time was about 15-20 min which I spent putting my Power support screen cover on.

Good luck guys!

 

[Trauma1]

Apple

I'm betting this is the problem. It sounds like a way of keeping things in tab and making sure all these Apple-bought iPhones (which it sounds like they're technically unlocked) go to those who actually bought them, and eventually get locked.

A phone purchased through Apple can go to any of the carriers, so there's an extra layer of security which is keeping the phone held down to that SIM/line.

A phone purchased through AT&T is not going to have such a measure because it is most likely already locked down to AT&T. With a helpful AT&T rep, this shouldn't be too difficult to fix once all of launch craziness subsides.

Technically speaking, any AT&T SIM card can go in any AT&T locked phone. It doesn't even have to be on the same account. So the fact that this is happening makes it sound like the problem is with the Apple-bought phones.

 

[am0rningview]

I ordered an iPhone 4S from Apple using an upgrade for another line on my family plan (a Samsung Impression, no micro SIM).

I received the iPhone today, called AT&T to do an upgrade swap and they switched the 4S micro SIM over to my number (also deactivating the SIM in my current phone, a Samsung Eternity, no micro SIM).

Now I can't activate the iPhone because the SIM doesn't match the account. Do I need to go to the AT&T store tomorrow?

 

[pellets007]

Were you guys swapping microSIMs before turning on and activating the phone? Because that's the number one thing to do when doing an upgrade swap: put in the SIM you want BEFORE you turn on and activate the phone. And this time you have to be especially vigilant because of the Over The Air activation feature. If you didn't do that, then obviously you're going to have problems, as it registers the IMEI and SIM that's already in there, and it will use the phone number on the line you pre-ordered/upgraded with. And now you have to backtrack everything, risk losing service in at least one line, and you may not have a helpful AT&T customer service rep.

I swapped a microSIM before turning on one of the iPhone 4S on my account. The number is correct, no lines lost service. The IMEI and other unique identifiers are correct. Everything on my AT&T Online Account Manager is correct, it even knows which lines have the 4S's. And I never had to contact anyone at AT&T.

Maybe this was all happening because of AT&T's faulty activation serves, as per usual. Or maybe this is an issue between buying through Apple vs AT&T. But if you didn't swap before turning on and activating the phone, well that's an operator error. Just remember it for next time.

I called AT&T and they told me to insert the new SIM card in, attached to another line other than that which was upgraded. They really ought to disseminate information to their employees. A technician I was transferred to didn't known how to activate the SIM via the 4S.

 

[jfrancis04]

Are you saying that the phone isn't activated and it's giving you the number you don't want on the screen you're on when you're starting to activate?

If so, mine did that at the ATT store even with my wife's sim in it. It still went through even though that number was incorrect.

Exactly! That's precisely what's happening even though AT&T says everything is correct.

Should I keep trying to activate or just leave it on the screen that says, "the sim card in your iPhone does not match..."?

 

[jasonycurtis]

so in order to switch them back I would just need their SIM #? I don't want to have to hassle my family too much with my issue

Just finished the process. The other person will have to put a fresh sim card in their phone. And then activate their phone on that new card. Once a card has been used and deactivated, it's trash.

 

[guitardave62000]

well I am currently going to try the following:

-Got the SIM # for the line I bought the phone with that is currently being used.

-Use a a blank/cold sim to hopefully activate the phone and will then be linked to the line the phone was bought with.

- Talk with AT&T and have them switch the SIM numbers back and then put my SIM back in

I'll let you know my results but does this sound possible?

EDIT: Person above answered my question, now I'm out of ideas

 

[pellets007]

Will calling Apple change anything? AT&T says everything is correct on their end. It's iTunes security that's the problem. Yes?

 

[Trauma1]

Should I keep trying to activate or just leave it on the screen that says, "the sim card in your iPhone does not match..."?

You probably don't have a third microSIM card to try, do you?

 

[elaniemay]

I will be calling AT&T to do the upgrade swap in a few minutes...but this thread has me worried. My husband has the 3GS and his line is the one we upgraded. I have a iP4 and he will be getting that phone, and I will be getting the iP4S. I hope this works out well...

 

[falco269]

Does anyone know if the 'cold SIM' method deactivates the SIM on the line the phone is associated with/was ordered on?

 

[Trauma1]

Will calling Apple change anything? AT&T says everything is correct on their end. It's iTunes security that's the problem. Yes?

Unfortunately, if it's a SIM issue I don't think Apple will be able to help. They'll most likely pass you back to AT&T because they don't do anything with SIMs.

I'm looking on AT&T's support page, and I don't see anything about this problem in particular with the 4S.

I know it's not the answer people want to hear, but be a little patient and someone will figure out exactly where the hang-up is and how to fix it. I just don't think a lot of Apple or AT&T employees think about upgrade swapping too often.

Is this happening with the Apple-bought iPhones? Or is there anyone who bought it through AT&T?

 

[jfrancis04]

You probably don't have a third microSIM card to try, do you?

Nope

 

[offcamber]

I have taken both phones involved with the "upgrade swap" into an AT&T store. They need both sims to make a smooth and easy swap. They have sims aplenty and can transfer accounts to these.
Takes 5-10 minutes.

 

[jeffpickl]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

I had no issues doing this. I had called AT&T BEFORE turning the new phone on. Told them I wanted to activate it under one of my other lines. Told her the phone number, sim card number, and imei and she did it in 10 mins. I was done. Turned it on, set it up, and no issues. Based on my experience it is important to do this BEFORE turning it on and you cannot activate online.

 

[jeffpickl]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A334 Safari/7534.48.3)

Damn, I can't believe I didn't think about this before. We have a family plan on Verizon with 5 phones, only one was eligible for upgrade and it wasn't mine. We ordered the 4S on the line that was eligible and was planning to do a ESN swap against my number.

So am I understanding correctly that the SIM the phone comes with will be pre-programmed against the number we did the upgrade on and I will need to go to a Verizon store to get a new SIM and have it programmed?

Verizon doesn't use sim cards. They do it strictly off of imei/meid numbers.

 

[Trauma1]

Nope

Which is more convenient to go to, an Apple Store or an AT&T store?

An AT&T store will no doubt give you fresh SIM cards and correctly associate each phone with each line.

An Apple Store may take a little more convincing. They would just go through the proper steps of upgrading and pass the SIM issue onto AT&T. One option could be to return it and buy another one, but then you get into the whole upgrade swap issue again, not to mention phone availability.

Another option might be to go to the Genius Bar. When they replace defective phones, they don't deal with SIM cards or upgrades. They just give you a new phone with a new SIM. Then it's up to you to connect to iTunes and enter your account info. This is all dependent on how flexible the Genius is with your "defective" phone.

 

[jfrancis04]

LOL. So guys, here's the official word from AT&T. Brace yourselves...

So I finally decided to call AT&T again (after already having 1 phone conversation, and 2 live chats; also 1 30 minute phone conversation with Apple). Actually got a friendly rep and she said this is an error message millions of customers are receiving. She said it's not on AT&T's end, but Apple's. They're having issues with activations (evidently, on upgrade swaps in particular). The system is backed up and can't catch up.

She went on to say that they received an official email from Apple saying as much. I let her know that I was on the phone with Apple an hr ago and they didn't mention this at all. The Apple rep had me restore the phone, but we still got the same error message.

She said the Apple rep didn't divulge this information because they aren't allowed to (uhh...what? ).

I then confirmed with AT&T for a THIRD time that my SIM cards have been properly associate to the correct phones. My number shows up with the appropriate iPhone 4S sim so everything should be fine.

I asked her if I should leave it on the error screen or keep trying. She said Apple and AT&T recommend trying to activate every hour. Well I'm going on hour #4 now and my phone has yet to be activated.

To make it even more hilarious, a previous AT&T rep I spoke with (via chat) said specifically to NOT attempt to activate again, saying that I would be moved further back in the queue.

What a friggin' joke...

 

[pittman87]

I got it to work! I had the upgrade swap issue. What I did was take the SIM card out of the phone which number was used to upgrade and put it in the new phone. Plugged it into iTunes. It then activated using the person's info it was purchased under. After it was activated I then swapped the SIM card back to the one that came with the 4S and put the one from the purchased upgrade line back into their 4. The 4S recognized the original SIM that came with the 4S as the number associated with my line.

 

[guitardave62000]

LOL. So guys, here's the official word from AT&T. Brace yourselves...

So I finally decided to call AT&T again (after already having 1 phone conversation, and 2 live chats; also 1 30 minute phone conversation with Apple). Actually got a friendly rep and she said this is an error message millions of customers are receiving. She said it's not on AT&T's end, but Apple's. They're having issues with activations (evidently, on upgrade swaps in particular). The system is backed up and can't catch up.

She went on to say that they received an official email from Apple saying as much. I let her know that I was on the phone with Apple an hr ago and they didn't mention this at all. The Apple rep had me restore the phone, but we still got the same error message.

She said the Apple rep didn't divulge this information because they aren't allowed to (uhh...what? ).

I then confirmed with AT&T for a THIRD time that my SIM cards have been properly associate to the correct phones. My number shows up with the appropriate iPhone 4S sim so everything should be fine.

I asked her if I should leave it on the error screen or keep trying. She said Apple and AT&T recommend trying to activate every hour. Well I'm going on hour #4 now and my phone has yet to be activated.

To make it even more hilarious, a previous AT&T rep I spoke with (via chat) said specifically to NOT attempt to activate again, saying that I would be moved further back in the queue.

What a friggin' joke...

So the iPhone 4s you are trying to activate now shows your number on the screen when asked to confirm? or still the line you upgraded with?

AT&T told me everything was switched on their end but the phone still shows the line that was upgraded

 

[NightStorm]

My experience matches this... When I went to the AT&T store they did everything right to switch the sim, but I couldn't get my iPhone 4 to deactivate with the new sim. Around 7:30pm they received a notice about upgrade swaps taking longer to process. I decided to take my chances and left the store to grab dinner; about an hour later it finally started receiving a signal and working again.

LOL. So guys, here's the official word from AT&T. Brace yourselves...

So I finally decided to call AT&T again (after already having 1 phone conversation, and 2 live chats; also 1 30 minute phone conversation with Apple). Actually got a friendly rep and she said this is an error message millions of customers are receiving. She said it's not on AT&T's end, but Apple's. They're having issues with activations (evidently, on upgrade swaps in particular). The system is backed up and can't catch up.

She went on to say that they received an official email from Apple saying as much. I let her know that I was on the phone with Apple an hr ago and they didn't mention this at all. The Apple rep had me restore the phone, but we still got the same error message.

She said the Apple rep didn't divulge this information because they aren't allowed to (uhh...what? ).

I then confirmed with AT&T for a THIRD time that my SIM cards have been properly associate to the correct phones. My number shows up with the appropriate iPhone 4S sim so everything should be fine.

I asked her if I should leave it on the error screen or keep trying. She said Apple and AT&T recommend trying to activate every hour. Well I'm going on hour #4 now and my phone has yet to be activated.

To make it even more hilarious, a previous AT&T rep I spoke with (via chat) said specifically to NOT attempt to activate again, saying that I would be moved further back in the queue.

What a friggin' joke...

 

[jfrancis04]

So the iPhone 4s you are trying to activate now shows your number on the screen when asked to confirm? or still the line you upgraded with?

AT&T told me everything was switched on their end but the phone still shows the line that was upgraded

I'm having the same issue as you. The phone still shows the number I upgraded on, but like you said, AT&T is saying it's correct on their end.

----------

My experience matches this... When I went to the AT&T store they did everything right to switch the sim, but I couldn't get my iPhone 4 to deactivate with the new sim. Around 7:30pm they received a notice about upgrade swaps taking longer to process. I decided to take my chances and left the store to grab dinner; about an hour later it finally started receiving a signal and working again.

Wow. Interesting. Maybe the AT&T rep was right. Kinda weird that the Apple reps were instructed to keep quiet about it though...or maybe they just hadn't been made aware of this yet when I spoke with them

----------

I got it to work! I had the upgrade swap issue. What I did was take the SIM card out of the phone which number was used to upgrade and put it in the new phone. Plugged it into iTunes. It then activated using the person's info it was purchased under. After it was activated I then swapped the SIM card back to the one that came with the 4S and put the one from the purchased upgrade line back into their 4. The 4S recognized the original SIM that came with the 4S as the number associated with my line.

So both lines are still working correctly now?

 

[falco269]

I got it to work! I had the upgrade swap issue. What I did was take the SIM card out of the phone which number was used to upgrade and put it in the new phone. Plugged it into iTunes. It then activated using the person's info it was purchased under. After it was activated I then swapped the SIM card back to the one that came with the 4S and put the one from the purchased upgrade line back into their 4. The 4S recognized the original SIM that came with the 4S as the number associated with my line.

My buddy that is having this same issue tried this and it worked! Success!

I'm still stuck as the line I want switch with is in a different state. I'll just keep trying.

 

[guitardave62000]

are we supposed to be leaving it on the screen of the SIM card error to eventually activate or do you just keep redoing the steps over and over again?

 

[JRoDDz]

Have two phones with another account numbers, which AT&T phone rep told me they have correctly moved over after giving them the IMEI and SIM number.

I wasn't getting the "The SIM car in your iPhone does not match the SIM card associated with your account" before, but now I am getting it on both lines.

Still unable to activate.

This is frustrating. Both old and new phones are down.

I am getting this same exact error after calling in to do an upgrade swap. Now my old line doesn't work either.